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Mom shares controversial response to girls who bullied her daughter over $45 Stanley bottle

Was this the right way to handle the situation?

via Dayna Motycka/TikTok and eBay

The Stanley Quencher is all the rage.

Kids learn about status symbols at a very young age. It seems that every generation, a new group of tweens has something that helps define the social pecking order at school, whether it’s having the right brand of Rollerblades in the ‘90s, Ugg boots in the 2000s, or the newest iPhone in the 2010s.

In 2024, the hip thing with the tween set is having a brand-name water bottle to bring to school, specifically a Stanley.

Historically, a Stanley was a blue-collar tumbler you’d bring to a construction site. But now, in a world where people are obsessed with hydration, the $45 bottle is all the rage amongst tweens and teens.

Dayna Motycka, the Ohio mother of a 9-year-old, shared a first-hand glimpse into the name-brand water bottle craze after her daughter was bullied for bringing a $10 Wamart tumbler to school. After returning to school from the holidays, 9 girls in her class got Stanley Tumblers.

@dayna_motycka

I in fact did not keep it short and sweet 🤦🏼‍♀️ apparently needed to get this off my chest! 🤷‍♀️ #stanleycups #valentinestanley #targetstanley #parentsteachingkids #parentingtips101

“And they made sure to let her know that this is not a real Stanley, that this is fake, and it’s not as cool,” Motycka said, pointing to her daughter’s cup.

In a video with over 3.4 million views, Motycka says she could have given her daughter an expensive tumbler but didn’t think it was necessary.

“Can we afford to buy her a Stanley? Yes. Did I think that she needed one? No,” she said. “Apparently, I’ve been proven wrong by the children in our school who are making fun of her for not having a real name-brand Stanley.”

The mother went to a local hardware store and bought her a Stanley for $35. She also noted that she owns one herself.

The mother believes this sort of bullying starts at home with the parents. “This doesn’t start with the kids. This starts with us, with parents, with moms. What are we teaching our kids?” she asked. Motycka says that if her daughter bullied someone for their water bottle, she would be in serious trouble.

“You’d better believe that if our nine-year-old daughter came home and, somehow, we found out that she had made fun of another girl at school for not having something name-brand… we would be calling the family, we would be making her write a note to apologize, we would make her apologize in person because that’s not what we do in this household,” she said.

The video makes an interesting point because, on one hand, the mother is judging other parents for raising kids who would be so petty as to bully another kid for their water bottle. On the other hand, after the girl was bullied, she bought her a Stanley water bottle to fit in with the kids who bullied her. She also owns one of the bottles herself.

Is the mother sending mixed messages, or does it all make sense?

"So basically, do as I say not as I do??? This has to be satire. The only explanation for making this video," an anonymous user commented on the video. “I'm not on board with her message about changing and not actually being the change she speaks of. Otherwise, I would agree with her 100%,” another user wrote.

One mom has taught her boys how to handle this type of bullying.

“My boys have followed my example. So they respond with things like ‘Well, at least I have the thing that I like instead of the thing everyone else likes,’” Kiki Rodriguez wrote.

In the end, Motycka admitted that teaching your kids confidence while shielding them from pain is hard.

"I feel this..but we should also teach our kids to be leaders with more confidence in themselves and their choices. Not being crowd followers," Aim wrote. "I agree with you! It’s just such a tough line," Motycka responded.

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Joy

Teen raises $186,000 to help 81-year-old Walmart worker pay off her mortgage and retire

'Life shouldn't be this hard.'

Photo by Jeremy Wong on Unsplash

Teen raises $186,000 to help Walmart worker retire.

In America, many people have to work well past the age of retirement to make ends meet. While some of these people choose to work past retirement age because it keeps them active, some older people, like Nola Carpenter, 81, work out of necessity.

Carpenter has been working at Walmart for 20 years, way beyond most people's retirement age just so that she can afford to continue to pay her mortgage. When 19-year-old Devan Bonagura saw the woman looking tired in the break room of the store, he posted a video to his TikTok of Carpenter with a text overlay that said, "Life shouldn't b this hard..." complete with a sad face emoji.

In the video, Carpenter is sitting at a small table looking down and appearing to be exhausted. The caption of the video reads ":/ I feel bad." Turns out, a lot of other people did too, and encouraged the teen to start a GoFundMe, which has since completed.

The retirement age in the United States in order to collect Social Security benefits is 66, or 67 if you were born in or after 1960. But early retirement starts at 62 for reduced benefits. How many years you worked is a deciding factor in how much financial benefit you will receive from Social Security, with the average amount expected to be $1,827 a month in January 2023.

@dbon973_

WE LOVE YOU NOLA I HOPE THIS HELPS❤️🙏 #blowthisup #fyp #gofundme #nola #walmart #viralvideo

While that amount of money is nothing to scoff at, it's also not enough to live off of alone, especially for those who fall below the average amount. You also have to factor in Medicare premiums and tax withholdings that must come out of that figure. So it's no wonder that people over the age of 67 have to continue to work if they don't have adequate savings put away to retire on. The cost of living increases impact all age groups, including the elderly.

Thankfully for this elderly Walmart worker, the GoFundMe quickly exploded and raised $110,000 in just 24 hours. But when Bonagura went to give the money to Carpenter, she was grateful for the help but explained she would still need to work until the other $60,000 of her mortgage was paid off. This prompted users to give more to secure Carpenter's retirement.

In the end, the GoFundMe raised $186,000, which was enough to pay off the mortgage on the woman's house. Retirement is now on the horizon for the grandmother, who says she's set to retire on the first of the year. She wants to make sure she helps her co-workers get through the holiday season before hanging up her vest for good.

@dbon973_

Update video with Nola ❤️ #nola #dbon #gofundme #viral #blowthisup #love #kindness #givingback

As for Bonagura, he's currently suspended with pay due to him filming at the store and posting it to TikTok. While he wasn't an employee of Walmart, he worked for a cellphone carrier that operated sales inside the store. Nevertheless, Bonagura feels he did the right thing and is focused solely on making sure Carpenter gets to retire.

It's amazing what people can accomplish when they work together. Happy retirement, Nola! Here's to hoping you enjoy every minute of it.

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Democracy

Strangers rally to pay for diapers a man stole from Walmart after he couldn't pay for them

via The Winter Haven Police Department / Facebook

A controversial post by the Winter Haven Police Department in Florida has dredged up a unique debate over whether it's acceptable for a seemingly desperate father to steal from a multi-billion dollar corporation.

On Saturday, the police department posted security camera footage of a man pushing a shopping cart with his two young children at a local Walmart. According to the police, the man attempted to buy diapers and baby wipes but his card was declined at the self-checkout.

The man left the store then returned without the children to buy the products with a different card which was also declined.

The man then left the store with the items without paying.

The police department posted a photo of the man on its Facebook page with a snarky comment. "So when your card is declined and you try another one with the same result, that is NOT license to just walk out with the items anyway," the department wrote.

(The original post by the Winter Haven Police Department did not obscure the man's face.)

The police department posted the images and description of the crime in an attempt to find the man and charge him with shoplifting. According to Winter Haven police, Walmart has a zero-tolerance policy and wants the man to be arrested.

This post rubbed a lot of people the wrong way because the man was caught stealing necessities for his children. He wasn't stealing alcohol or a television set. Diapers are not cheap and there are a lot of people struggling to make ends meet during the pandemic.

The post received well over 1,000 comments with many offering to pay for what the man stole.

via Facebook

via Facebook

via Facebook

via Facebook

There were also a lot of people who thought the police department acted in poor form by shaming a man who committed a crime to provide necessities for his children. Many called the department directly to say they believe the charges should be dropped.

via Facebook

via Facebook

via Facebook

It's impossible to know what type of pressure the man was under when he decided it was better to steal the diapers and wipes instead of paying for them. If he had access to money at home but didn't feel like making a second trip, then stealing the diapers was clearly wrong.

But if the man was down on his luck and had no other options then one can understand his decision. If he didn't, he would have been forced to neglect the health of his young children which is also morally reprehensible.

Regardless if you agree with the man's actions or not, his children shouldn't have to go without clean diapers.

Some in the comments said that there are community resources available to parents who need help affording diapers and he should have reached out to one of those organizations before he decided to steal.

Whether the man was right to steal or not, comes down to all of our personal values. But the positive thing that has come out of the story is the number of people who were willing to help the man by paying for his diapers. It shows that there are a lot of kind-hearted people out there that are looking for ways to help those in need.

It was also heartening to see the number of people who criticized the police department for shaming a man that committed a crime out of what appeared to be desperation. The police have a duty to uphold the law, but that doesn't mean it's right for them to shame parents who are in need.

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Top Splash

Good job: Target has permanently raised its employee minimum wage to $15 an hour

via Mike Mozart / Flickr

Target has announced that it will raise its minimum wage to $15 an hour beginning July 5. The decision makes good on a promise it made three years ago to raise its starting rate to $15 an hour by 2020.

The move will impact over 275,000 employees in its distribution centers and retail stores.

Target's decision comes after many of America's larger retailers gave their employees temporary raises for working through the COVID-19 pandemic. However, many of those stores, including Starbucks, Kroger, and Amazon have done away with their pandemic raises over the past few weeks.

On March 25, Target moved its starting wage temporarily to $15 an hour after the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a global pandemic. Now, it's made the decision permanent.

In addition to the raise in its starting wage, Target will give a $200 "recognition bonus" to workers on its front lines as well as additional perks including on-demand fitness classes, back up child and family care, free doctor visits, and thermometers.

"Everything we aspire to do and be as a company builds on the central role our team members play in our strategy, their dedication to our purpose and the connection they create with our guests and communities," CEO Brian Cornell said in a statement.

Target's decision comes at a time when the Federal minimum wage is woefully behind at just $7.25 an hour and hasn't been raised since 2009. Currently, 29 states and the District of Columbia have minimum wages above $7.25. Washington D.C.'s is $14 per hour while California and Washington have the highest state minimum wages at $13 per hour.

The $15 minimum wage is a special figure in the fight against poverty in America. In 2012, two hundred fast-food workers walked off the job to demand $15/hr and union rights in New York City, launching the Fight for $15 movement.

Independent, and sometimes Democratic, Senator and presidential candidate Bernie Sanders has been one of the biggest advocates for a $15 minimum wage, having made it a prominent part of his platform for years.

"Just a few short years ago, we were told that raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour was 'radical.' But a grassroots movement of millions of workers throughout this country refused to take 'no' for an answer," Sanders said.

"It is not a radical idea to say a job should lift you out of poverty, not keep you in it," he continued. "The current $7.25 an hour federal minimum wage is a starvation wage. It must be increased to a living wage of $15 an hour."

via Stephen Melkisethian / Flickr

Sanders' call for an increase in the wage brought this one-time radical position to the forefront of Democratic politics when in 2019, the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives passed the Raise the Wage act that would make $15 the new federal minimum wage for all American workers by 2025.

The act still has yet to pass the Republican-controlled White House and Senate, which seems highly unlikely. But, should fortunes change in November, a $15 minimum wage in five years doesn't seem too far-fetched.

While state and federal legislatures drag their heels when it comes to raising the minimum wage, we can all support the movement by shopping at places that support their employees and the economy at-large by paying fair wages.

So next time you go shopping and have the choice between Walmart — which pays a starting wage of $11 to $12 — or Target, the choice should be pretty clear.

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